THE SARAH AYERS BAND: BIO

The Sarah Ayers Band began cooking up their unique blend of blues, funk, and rock on a cold Tuesday night in January '02 as the hosts of a brand new blues jam in Macungie, PA as Sarah's Rhythm Recipe. Little did they know that less than a month later their little blues jam would be the hottest jam in the Valley. Since that time, the group has branched out to become one of the valley's best blues bands. Their spicy recipe for funky, kick-ass, butt-shaking blues has rocketed them right through the usual rites of passage for a new blues band, peforming at the Lehigh Valley Blues and Jazz Festival, competing in the regional and national International Blues Challenge, and performing in the Best of the Lehigh Valley Festival. Sarah has been awarded Best Female Vocalist at the Lehigh Valley Music Awards every year since 2003. In each year she has also taken home 25 additional awards in other categories, including: best original band, best blues vocalist, best all around performer, best original song Body Says Yes, and best Overall CD in 2007 for 3 AM Epiphany.

SARAH AYERS

Sarah Ayers has known she wanted to sing professionally ever since she drew applause from her high chair at age two by serenading the dining room at New York's Plaza Hotel. She earned her bachelor's degree in opera performance and studio teaching from Susquehanna University. In her senior year she had the honor of being one of the youngest to ever win an award at the Metropolitan Opera Competition. Sarah has sung opera with a wide range of companies from the Reading Orchestra to the Anchorage Opera Company. It was in Anchorage, Alaska that Sarah got her first taste of the blues, singing Janis Joplin, Etta James, and Koko Taylor covers with the 76th Street Blues Band and Paul Byrd and the Escalators. Sarah got her start in the local blues scene when she filled in for six months for lead singer Beverly Conklin of BC & The Blues Crew, one of the Lehigh Valley's most respected and talented blues bands. Today she leads The Sarah Ayers Band, Sarah's Acoustic Brew and is one-third of the blues/roots trio The Girls.

Sarah Ayers

GREG LIPSKY (guitar)

Greg Lipsky is a veteran guitarist from the Lehigh Valley.  He has had the pleasure of playing with a wide variety of musicians in styles ranging from original rock, blues and pop to 60’s, 70’s, 80’s and 90’s covers.  Greg can be heard on many local original artists’ cd’s, including Leechboy and Scott Marshall, and the first Sarah Ayers Band CD, “Cold, hard, dirty truth”.

DAN EVANS (bass)

Dan Evans started playing bass in 1980 and has been playing for over 25 years now.  A native of Bethlehem, PA he has played with a variety of bands in the Lehigh Valley since 1989.  Some of the bands and/or musicians Dan has played with over the years include the Evan Hall Band, John Bloys & the Boogie Stew, Wayne Smith, the Nastasee Brothers, Scott Bradoka, the Jeff Bellfy Band, Steve Brosky and His Big Little Band, Joe Mixon, Jake Kaligis, and the Aardvarks. Some of Dan’s musical highlights so far have been a Stabler Arena appearance opening for Bauchman Turner Overdrive (BTO) with Bellfy and a tour of Germany with Scott Bradoka opening for guitarist Lee Ritenour. 

 

JIM RUFFI (drums)

Jim has been drumming for over 30 years. A New Jersey native, he has performed and recorded with countless NJ/NY/PA area bands, such as Chapter 11, Crossroads, The John Kasper Band, Sunrise, Chessmen, Brian Molnar, Traitor Phil, Mark Conklin and The Bluebloods, Burgundy, The Scarlet Blue Band, Wet Cats in a Burlap Sack, Walk The Talk, Red-Headed Boogie Child, Kimara Lovelace, Big Daddy and The Wildcats, Barry Britton Tributes and many others. He has toured the U.S. with Frank Zappa tribute/ alumni band Project/Object and performed in Europe with Blue Note jazz vocalist Alan Harris and blues legend Keisa Brown. Jim is experienced in all musical styles, from straight-ahead jazz, to hard rock, from funk and R&B to Country and Folk, covering progressive rock bands, such as Rush and The Dregs and tackling the complex time and style shifts of Zappa. He has a particular interest in “groove-based music,” focusing the past 10 years’ efforts on building a strong foundation of Soul, Blues, R&B and Funk drumming.